


You won't feel the bullets!

by Lionheart39



Category: Doctor Who (1963)
Genre: Friendship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-28
Updated: 2021-01-28
Packaged: 2021-03-14 15:35:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,541
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29048529
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lionheart39/pseuds/Lionheart39
Summary: Weeks after the Inferno incident the Doctor is still having  problems getting over meeting the Brigade Leader!
Kudos: 5





	You won't feel the bullets!

Liz Shaw wasn't the only person to notice it, because as she glanced over towards the Brigadier she saw that he had seen it too. And what's more it, was puzzling him as well, and not just puzzling him, it was worrying him. It was the way the Doctor flinched every time he saw the Brigadier, especially if the Brigadier was to come into the Doctor's view unexpectedly. 

Corporal Bell was now bringing messages from the Brigadier to the lab, rather then him coming to the lab himself. When Liz asked Carol about it she had told her that the Brigadier wanted to give the Doctor a bit of space to get over whatever had happened to him!

Liz was worried about how withdrawn the Doctor was, he spoke very little to anyone, including her. As for the Brigadier he also seemed to be very subdued. 

Liz missed the easy rapport there had been between the three of them. The Brigadier used to come to the lab frequently for a chat and a coffee during the day. And late at night the Doctor and herself would frequently visit the Brigadier's office and persuade him to stop filling in paperwork and share a drink before they all retired for the night. This was especially important on those nights after the troops had been in action. Because for all of Alistair stolid exterior, both the Doctor and she knew inside the man would be hurting. He would be questioning every order that he had given, to see if he could have prevented any of the deaths.

Liz had left the Doctor quietly tinkering with his TARDIS at 10.30 pm. He had hardly spoken to her in hours. She was tired so went straight up to her room on the third floor, of the east wing, of the main house. None of the personnel accommodation at UNIT HQ could be termed, luxurious, most of the rooms used would have been servants quarters when the house was built. At least the rooms in the main house were single occupancy, unlike the barracks that most of the men were billeted in. The East wing was for senior female staff.

Liz woke up at 2.20 am and headed for the bathroom, on her way back to her room she glanced out of the window at the end of the corridor. She could see a light on in the lab, that wasn't unusual, as the doctor being, a Time Lord, didn't seem to require much sleep, and often worked late into the night. She could almost hearing pontificating about it in his usual smug manner, ‘We Time Lords don't require sleep the same way that humans need it!’ When he did she would usually have to try and suppress a laugh as Alistair would roll his eyes. The thought of those days, now no more, made her heart ache. 

Other lights were visible in the main house, she knew the radio room, and the guard room were manned 24/7. There was a light on in the duty officers room, which was to be expected. But there shouldn't be one in the Brigadier's office! Surely he wasn't still filling in forms at almost 2.30 am. Liz pulled her dressing gown around her tightly and headed down the stairs. She nodded to the guard patrolling the ground floor and was about to knock on the Brigadier’s door when Sargent Benton came out of the duty officer’s room and stopped her. Placing a finger on his lips he quietly opened the door. Liz looked inside to see the Brigadier still in immaculate uniform, not a hair out of place, spark out on the desk, pen still in hand.

Benton looked at Liz and gave a little grimace as he quietly closed the door. 

“Does that happen often?” Liz asked.

”It used to, before the Doctor came! Now the Doctor’s stopped dropping by he‘s gone back to working past 01.00 hours most nights. Every few days he’ll finish the night like that!

Liz looked worried, “That's not good for any one!”

He'll wake about 05.45 hours and go for a run! I’ve found it best to just leave him to it. After all since he and Mrs Lethbridge-Stewart split up, there isn't any good reason I can give to make him stop working!”

He sighed deeply! 

I wish, the Doctor, was still keeping an eye on him, at least he could bully the Brigadier into taking better care of himself!” 

Liz nodded.

“Have you any idea, what's wrong with the Doctor?” Benton asked.

“I think it's something to do with what happened to him in that parallel universe!”

“But why? I mean I know he said I was a thug and you were... well!” John blushed. "And the Brigade Leader was a bully and a coward! But none of us are like that! The Brigadier is a good CO and he certainly isn't a coward!” 

“I know!” Liz said sadly.

She squeezed the sergeant’s arm. “I'll talk to the Doctor!”

She headed back to her room even more determined to sort the Doctor out. 

Liz entered the senior staff mess hall at 7.20am, collected toast and tea and looked around to see who else was in the room. The Brigadier, in fatigues, was eating a bacon sandwich while reading a report! The Doctor was sitting at the other side of the room, facing the Brigadier's back, drinking tea and keeping him under close scrutiny! 

Liz glanced at Alistair as she walked towards his table. He made a very discreet hand signal to stop her from joining him and flicked a finger to indicate that Liz should join the Doctor. So Liz did.

“He's plotting something, Liz!” the Doctor told her, in a hushed voice as she sat next to him.

“Who is?” Liz asked before biting into her toast.

“The Brigade Leader!” he said staring at the Brigadier.

Liz frowned at him as she swallowed her toast and took a drink of tea.

“But Doctor, that's the Brigadier! He's your friend!“

“Is he, is he really?”

“For goodness sake, Doctor, you know he is!” she said in exasperation.

“He's plotting against me, reporting back to his superiors!”

Liz blinked and shook her head, this was paranoia! 

She finished her toast and took another drink of tea while she decided how to proceed with this conversation. 

Finally she decided not to argue with him, it would be better to try to get the Doctor to reason it through.

“What makes you think that?”

“Come with me, you'll see!”

She was surprised when they headed out to the garage were Bessie was kept!

“Every Wednesday he leaves the base at 7.45 am and returns at midday, and he's always in disguise!”

She glanced at the clock on Bessie’s dashboard, 7.44 am

Liz watched the door and saw the Brigadier leave the main building in civilian clothes and get into his sports car.

“See!”

“Doctor, he's wearing his civilian clothes, that's not a disguise! He's just taking the morning off!”

The Doctor snorted! “Whenever does the Brigadier take time off? You'll see, he's passing on information about me to his superiors!”

The Brigadier drove to the main gate and the corporal on duty saluted and raised the barrier. 

“But Doctor, he could just phone them or send them a report if he wanted to do that!”

“Yes, but not without me knowing, I've got his office bugged and I’ve been checking all the reports on Corporal Bells desk every night!”

Liz couldn't believe what he was saying. 

The Doctor didn't start Bessie up, he just sat watching the Brigadier's car disappearing from view!

“Well if you're going to follow him hadn't we better get going? He's almost out of sight!”

The Doctor turned and smiled, he flipped a switch and a screen that Liz had seen him fitting the day before lit up. It showed a map and a small red dot blinking on and off as it moved along the map away from the base.

She looked at him in disbelief.

“You planted a tracker on the Brigadier's car?” she asked with incredulity.

“Of course I did!” The Doctor said as he started Bessie up heading towards the main gate without slowing for the barrier! The Corporal only just managed to swing it out of the way before they crashed into it! 

They sped through the countryside heading towards Guilford!

The Doctor wasn't speaking his face was set in a determined way! Liz was sat just wishing she had put a thicker cardigan on. Bessie wasn't the warmest car to travel in!

The Doctor was monitoring the Brigadier's car on the screen and saw it stop near a park! He stopped to checked the map and then took a route that brought them to the other side of the park!

He removed a telescope from the glove box and watched the Brigadier leave his car and head into a secluded seating area. 

He turned to look at Liz, “A clandestine meeting! It's text book!”

Liz looked at him sceptically!

“Well, why else would he be travelling to Gilford to sit in a park?”

Liz didn't know, but she couldn't imagine the Brigadier would be betraying the Doctor.

Suddenly the Doctor grasped her arm, “The side gate, look!” 

Liz saw a tall man in his late fifties who was dressed very casually, but with an obvious military bearing heading towards the Brigadier!

“See, I was right a clandestine meeting! Come on Liz, I want to listen in!”

He had grabbed Liz's arm and was dragging her through the shrubbery towards the bench where the Brigadier was sitting!

She was sure at any minute the Brigadier would hear them, and all hell would break loose if he discovered that they had been spying on him! But the Brigadier seemed distracted, he was looking at the man approaching him in a puzzled way.

“Peter, you're on your own? Where's...”

Suddenly Liz saw a little girl, with blond hair, in a yellow summer dress, run up behind the Brigadier and grasp him around the leg!

“Surprised Daddy!” the little girl shouted!

Alistair whirled around, a wide grin lighting up his face as he bent down and scooped up the youngster planting kisses on her cheeks as he hugged her close! Then he spun her around as she whooped with glee!

“Tiger, I've missed you!” Alistair said as he hugged her close again.

The older man smiled sadly.

“It can only be for an hour Alistair, Fiona's only having a shampoo and set. She’ll be meeting Kate and me in the park cafe at 10:15! I know it's not long, and it's not right what Fiona's doing! But if she finds out you've been here then...” 

“ It'll make everything worse!” Alistair said sadly. “I know, thanks Peter! Thanks for this.. I ...!” 

The other man just grasped his hand and shook it!

“I'll leave you two together. Get off and enjoy yourselves!” the older man said patting the little girl’s head!

“Bye Grandad!” the little girl said waving the man off.

Liz felt tears pricking her eyes, she knew that the Brigadier was going through a rather acrimonious divorce. But she hadn't realised that he was being denied access to his daughter!

“Come on Tiger, lets go and see how fast you can climb up that slide!”

They watched as Alistair swung the little girl up on to his shoulders before heading off towards the children's play area. The older man went over to sit on a bench at the other side of the park.

“Come on Doctor, best we get back, before the Brigadier spots us!”

He just nodded, but never said a word as they walked back to Bessie. He remained quiet on the drive back and Liz saw that he was very deep in thought! As they got back to the base he even, much too the Corporal‘s surprise stopped to show his pass.

They parked Bessie in the garage and walked into the lab.

Liz decided to make some tea. As she set the tea and the bag of sugar down in front of the Doctor he looked up at her and for the first time in nearly two hours he spoke to her!

“I'm sorry Liz, I've been a bit of an ass, haven't I?”

“Just a bit!” she said smiling sardonically.

He rubbed his face, noticed the tea and started spooning sugar into the cup.

“That was the Brigadier, Alistair, wasn't it?”

Liz nodded!

“He's my friend, he wouldn't betray me. He was just going to see his daughter!”

Liz nodded sadly.

“He's nothing like the Brigade Leader is he?”

“Well, from your description of the Brigade Leader, I'd say he was totally the opposite!”

“Mmm, I know were I got the reasoning wrong Liz!” he said rubbing his chin, “Because Section Leader Elizabeth Shaw had elements of you, good elements,” he emphasised, “and Benton in that world had elements of our Benton!” 

At Liz's sceptical look, the Doctor explained.

“That Benton was Loyal to his commander, efficient and brave!” 

Liz smiled, nodded and decided John Benton would probably like to know that!

“I thought there had to be similarities between all the people on both of the worlds!”

“I suppose that's a possibility, but your sample size for making that conclusion was a trifle small!”

“No, there were versions of Stahlman, Sir Keith, Dr Williams and Greg Sutton on that world too, and I could see similarities in all of them to their counterparts on our world. But, I, couldn't see any similarities between the Brigadier and the Brigade Leader! He was a selfish, cowardly, brutal thug! Yet Alistair is none of those things, but there has to be some similarities. So I theorised that Alistair must be like the Brigade Leader underneath, that he was just hiding that part of himself!”

“But that’s absurd Doctor! Isn't it more likely that the Brigade Leader was hiding his better qualities, those qualities that the Brigadier has!”

The Doctor shook his head.

“No Liz he was a bully and a coward! A stubborn, pig headed, ill informed..”

His eyes opened wide, “They do have elements that are the same!” the Doctor said relieved.

Liz just hid a smiled and she decided she wouldn't share that with the Brigadier!

As they entered into the mess hall at 12.30 they saw the Brigadier looking very subdued. He was moodily pushing his lunch around his plate.

“Poor Alistair,” the Doctor murmured, “I hadn't realised that his divorce was so bitter! It must be breaking his heart being kept from Kate.”

Liz had to smile as the Doctor collected his lunch and walked up to the Brigadier's table.

“Mind if I sit here, old man?” he asked smiling sadly.

The Brigadier looked up in surprise.

“No, no, of course not Doctor!” he said as a smile twitched at his lips.

Liz smiled and headed over to join Carol Bell and John Benton!

“That's a sight for sore eyes!” Carol said as she saw the two old friends chatting.

John Benton smiled at Liz, “Well Done, Miss!” he whispered!


End file.
